A Crystal Cast
by Kazegami-inkpot
Summary: -Soldier's with Wings pairing- Set four years later. It was a dark time, where lovers stood back to back with betrayal and enemies stood hand in hand. Only one thing could save them. The future. Assuming they arrived.


**Hello everyone. I rise from the dead with this. I know I've been gone for a long time. A lot has happened (not bad stuff though lol). Halfdemon-Kai's birthday just passed recently and I promised her this story for it. I didnt want it to be a one shot though, so thats why it took so long for me to start it. It's back to ToTa with me, and the more I talked to her about it, the more I sorely missed it. **

**So anyway! If you liked Soldier's with Wings then you'll probably like this one. Well I guess what I mean to say is, if you're capable of having and open mind like you did with SwW then most likely you will like this one. I have to warn the audience though that this story is a bit darker than the previous ones, and is rated M for a reason.**

**Ps. This story is more for people who have read my previous ToTA stories. If you wish to read this one, I suggest you read Soldiers with Wings first. Thank you.**

**Okay. Here goes. I'm sorry if I'm a bit rusty.**

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><p>"Sin, time to go. She's been spotted nearing the barrier."<p>

The girl named Sin opened her eyes wearily and stared at the plain rocky wall of the cave she had been sitting in for the past four hours. She didnt want to look at him until she asked her question.

"Who?"

Syft let a short breath out through his nose. Sin knew this wasnt due too annoyance - they were too far gone for that - but rather, the knowledge that she hadn't given up on the hope that it would be someone else. A different 'she'.

"It's Scion..."

Sin closed her eyes with the pain she felt in her heart, and tried her best to wait for it to pass. A false hope though, she knew.

"My barrier is weakening..." she murmured quietly as she attempted to stand up. The glowing green crystal in her lap made the movement difficult, and she had to inwardly confess that being seperated from it worried her to no end. She shook this feeling off however and pushed herself to her feet, letting the orb slide gently onto the white cushion where she had previously been kneeling.

Syft nodded rather matter of factly as she came closer. "I know, I've seen it flicker a few times in the night while you sleep."

The tiny framed girl pressed her pale fingers to her forhead as she walked past him. He turned and followed quietly beside her.

"I try to keep it steady...but even I must confess that dividing my power between two goals leaves one of them with less protection...as much as I don't want to admit it."

The boy with the pine green hair nodded again as they stepped out under the blue of the midday sky. "Just try and keep it up," he stated, eyes forward.

Sin nodded in agreement. She was glad he didn't tell her to rest or to take a much needed break. In truth neither of them could afford it. A break meant certain problems. It meant that their ideals could afford a break from fate. They could lose control of their puzzle pieces.

The sun burned her eyes so severely that a splitting pain shot across her mind. Syft shook his head in what almost seemed like a sad manner as he watched her. She had long ago learned to ignore this look from him though, knowing that he had not the right nor the courage to ask her to change her ways.

"I'm alright," she lied quickly. "It passes quickly enough."

She removed her hand from her forehead and blinked repeatedly.

He laughed a hollow laugh, followed by a tired smirk. "Couldn't you just sit on top of the mountain and maintain the barrier? At least then you'd get some light."

The black haired girl laughed quickly. "And watch that menacing crystal mass in the distance reach for our stronghold? Not likely."

As she said this she looked back to her sparesly decorated cave. Syft caught the motion.

"It'll be fine. The other replica's would protect that orb with their life. You know that."

Sin swallowed in worry and let her eyes fall to the stone and grass beneath her feet. "They are like sheep..." she stated. Syft lifted an eyebrow at her, but Sin had cast off her carefully trained manners much time ago.

She continued. "They can distract the wolf, but can they win? And what if there are two wolves...whose the distraction then?"

"Calm down. You've become too attached to that thing. Maybe I should hold it for a while."

She whipped her eyes to him.

"I am _not_ corrupt," Sin stated in a harsh whisper, offended. "And besides, you cant control seventh fonons, and it needs them."

The de-throned king stopped walking and clenched his fist. Sin stopped reluctantly a few good steps ahead of him but didnt turn to look back.

"What's this about Sin?" Syft asked seriously. "You've changed."

She remained quiet and stared unwaveringly forward. He continued.

"You blame yourself don't you?" he asked. Sin felt her eyes lower a fraction of an inch.

"Is that what you've been wasting your energy on? Trying to change him back through the Seed Orb?"

The replica furrowed her eyebrows as she backed into his probing corner. Out of the corner of her orange eyes, she saw him shake his head the slightest amount. She knew it was disappointment.

_'In me...' _she inwardly concluded.

"That's not going to change what's happened, replica. Asch is a lost cause. How do you know the orb even affects him anymore?"

Defeated, Sin shook her head, allowing her long dark hair to sway behind her. "I don't. But...it did this to him. It put us all in this chaos. Perhaps if I channel enough of my seventh fonon's into the seed it will reach him and change him ba-"

Syft cut her off by placing a firm but final hand on her shoulder. She hoped dearly that his moment wouldn't come.

"Stop this Sin, you know why that will never work. If you can't handle the Seed Orb then I will. I trusted you when you fed it seventh fonons...but you've been putting us all at risk. Don't you realize that?"

The young man swept his arm outward, forcing Sin to raise her eyes once more.

He was gesturing to the small tents and domains made of hide skin's and wood built up and down their mountain. People of all shapes and sizes, young and old strolled through her vision and she couldnt force her guilt away. She had risked all these replicas lives and what was worse, these replicas who were loyal to her and Syft.

"I'm sorry..." she confessed. Indeed if the barrier fell because of her, they were all doomed. "I just cannot let go."

They began walking again, and the people around them greeted them with appreciative nods and cheerful but worn smiles. Briefly she wondered why she couldnt be the one cheering someone on.

"No one is asking you to," he stated simply with a lop-sided shrug. "But we have to focus on the matter at hand...and right now that is Scion."

Sin quickened her pace even those these encounters always left her literally shaken. "Spoken like a true king."

He rolled his green-blue eyes quickly but Sin could tell that the other side of his face was pulled up in what could have been a small smile. She smiled a sad smile to herself, knowing full well that the only good times they had were the good old days.

She could see the edge of the barrier now and her heart quickened to what seemed like a frightened tremor inside her chest. She knew this could very well be the end of their shielded little rebellion.

'Why couldn't I just stop lending it my fonons?' she wondered as her and Syft came to a slow stop on the inside of her barrier. 'Then maybe I could hold the barrier a little bit longer...!'

Inside she knew exactly why she had lent the Seed Orb her fonons. It had asked for them almost desperately. As if could die any moment without her there to nurture it.

And Asch...

She wanted to save him.

The fonons the seed took...they had to go somewhere right? As much as the seed begged her subconsious to feed it, she was not to whom it was connected.

And for that, she hated the entity far more than she hated her actions. It wanted Asch. It was because of the orb that Syft had labelled him a lost cause. It was because of the orb that she was forced into believing the de-throned king of Blue Abarath.

The replica gritted her teeth together hard in anger. Never before did she believe in lost causes.

"There she is..." Syft whispered.

Sin snapped immedietely out of her outraged thoughts and into reality. Scion was approaching them on the other side of the barrier.

The replica was forced to swallow hard when she gazed upon her silver haired friend, and felt the weight of all the other young woman's emotions crush down upon her shoulders.

Shining green met blazing orange, and in that moment Sin knew what was to follow.

A battle that she could never win.

Scion stopped on the other side of the barrier quietly and pushed down her blood-red hood so that the rest of her silver hair slid out and down her shoulders. Silence followed as they passed unspoken apologies between each other.

Finally, she spoke. "Been a while."

Syft stepped forward. "Tch, not long enough in my books."

Sin did not turn to look at him for this statement, understanding that what sounded like an insult to the woman was merely a wish for more time away from this situation.

Scion slowly turned her trained eyes onto him. "Unforunately that is not for me to decide."

Sin felt the forgein stinging behind her eyes and fought to keep her focus. She couldn't afford to let her emotions out now, not with this critical moment placed before her once more.

Scion let her eyes drift to the barrier that was between them before she spoke again. "Your barrier is weakening Sin, we watched it flicker last night. You are growing weak."

Sin pressed a hand to her chest in anxiousness. "Please Scion...you don't have to-"

But she was cut off as Scion ignored her, just as Sin knew she would. "We cannot keep up this little charade forever..." she said in what sounded like brutal honesty. "Day by day you grow weak by holding onto this."

She gestured to the small mountain behind them. "Asch is patient, and will send me again very soon."

Sin couldn't help herself. "How...how is he?"

Scion turned to her with furrowed eyebrows and unwavering eyes. The replica waited in anticipation, barely able to breathe.

They stood there in silence for a moment until Sin realized that Scion didn't seem to understand her question. The replica realized her question implied that he _could_ be someone else.

"How is he...?" Scion repeated emotionlessly. Sin lowered her eyes, more than crestfallen.

"Why don't you come with me and ask him yourself?" the silver haired girl asked, lifting her hand the slightest bit in what seemed to be a half serious gesture. "He wants you almost as much as he wants the Seed Orb."

Sin took a steady step back. "I can't do that."

Her friend-turned-enemy lowered her hand back to her side. "Of course you can't."

It was a mocking jab and an approval in one breath.

"Of course..." Scion began lowly as she moved her feet a little further apart. Sin realized she was steadying herself for something. "The reason Asch chooses me is because I will fight for the things I believe in...the things I _love_..."

Syft shouted then and Sin knew something she did not see was coming. "Look Sin!"

He pointed above her quickly and she jerked her vision skyward. The clouds above her barrier rumbled threateningly, and just below them she could see purple light carving itself into an intricate inscription in the air.

_'Oh no...!'_

"But he owns these things of mine!" The green-eyed girl told them above the roar of the wind. "So I must follow these forced ideals of his...!"

Sin was caught in the frightened trance of the crackling sky until she felt a forceful hand on her shoulder. Syft pushed her down to her knees, and it suddenly occured to her that this barrier was her responsibility. That the replicas underneath it were her sisters and bretheren.

There was a moment where she caught Syft's eye through her black hair twisting in the wind, and somehow she could figure out through the terror of this reality that was quickly becoming her world... the last and only thing she could do.

"Pray..!" he shouted to her.

She closed her eyes and clasped her hands over her chest as she listened to the last and final words of her lost friend.

"And you...!" Scion stated icily over her storming wind. "You must fight with every last piece of shattering hope you own!"

Sin took the words in and quieted her heart. It was Scion's undying request to her.

"_Indignation!_"

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><p>"How can it be...?" Scion whispered to herself as the crystallized purple floor rose up to meet her as she fell onto her hands and knees. A small bead of sweat rolled down her pale face as she tried to steady her shaking body. Her muscles screamed for mercy and oxygen, and her head throbbed so forcefully she could literally see the blurry pulse in her eyes. She would have moved to the bed - its soft and silken sheets tempting her scrambled thoughts - but somehow...she knew she didnt deserve such luxury.<p>

She had put every ounce of power behind that terrifyingly powerful spell. The purple lightning that had crashed down from the sky and the noise had almost thrown her from her stance. It was perfect. She had performed it perfectly.

_'So why?'_ she wondered, her eyes narrowing in confusion as she lowered herself to the floor.

The barrier had _still_ been standing. An event that shook her very will to the core.

_'Am I weak?'_ she wondered briefly before discarding the idea. Asch had taught her the spell. The very nature of the incantation rejected weakness.

_'Then...'_ she began to understand quietly in the silence of her room. _'Am I unwilling?'_

Who was she kidding? She was the most unwilling pawn in Asch's chess game. How could she ever hope to break through Sin's barrier of prayer if she didn't even believe in what she was doing? It didn't matter how many times she was able to cast the devastating spell upon Syft and Sin. She would never be able to break through if she knew deep within her heart she didn't want any harm to come to them.

_'My friends...'_

Still, it amazed her that Sin had held it. Sure, when the dust finally settled the replica was clearly unconscious - but the barrier was still present. She could not enter.

She could not appologize.

_'Good job Sin...and Syft too I suppose...'_ she thought to herself tiredly with a small smile as she let her cheek rest on the cool crystal floor. Syft's hands had been severely burned at the end of it all. Scion could only assume he had tried to help Sin by stabalizing the barrier with his own power.

Of course, this required touching it while her spell split through it. But still she had no regrets. They had all given it their best effort, and it occured to her ironically that the barrier falling was one over her very last wishes. The people sheltered underneath it were her hope. They were the very last sliver of light that remained from their old lives.

The silver haired girl closed her eyes. Would Asch be mad that she came back with neither Sin, nor the very powerful Seed Orb?

_'No...'_ she told herself soundly. This Asch didn't get mad.

He got even. Which was perhaps, in her mind...worse.

Just then she heard a soft sound and without moving she knew it was a person at her door...or rather...her hole in the crystal wall that was covered by a translucent curtain. She didn't bother moving from her resting place on the floor because she didn't feel the pulsing aura that radiated off Asch when he was near. It must have been a minor being...a maid?

"My lady...Lord Asch would like to speak with you."

She wasn't surprized the girl didn't inquire about her odd position on the floor. The maids were accustomed to seeing her out of breath or severely bruised from her 'training' with Asch. Sometimes she even collapsed in the crystalline halls - not even able to make it to her bed. Much like this very day.

"Of course he does..." she whispered to herself.

The silence told her that the maid had left quickly and quietly. This didn't surprize her either as she somehow managed to push herself onto her knees and look at the door. Most - if not all - were terribly frightened of Asch. It wasn't as if they had a choice at all whether they wanted to serve him.

It's just how it came to be. Even she was helpless to resist this corrupted new being who pulled the strings of all aspects of her life. What would happen if he got Sin too?

Her legs shook as she focused on the new task of making her way to him. The only thing that managed to get her moving was the idea he managed to firmly insert into her brain that not obeying him would only layer hurt on hurt.

And she believed it with every unwilling fibre of her being.

The castle she moved through was menacing in its otherworldliness. The whole thing from the sparkling floor to the highest shining spike that reached for the sky was made of the hardest, most beautiful crystal. The hall she walked down now was a pale pink, with what seemed to be white crystal laced through it.

With the power he had aquired, Asch had wasted no time in building his impassable, inescapable fortress and forcing her into submission behind its walls. It seemed as if the crystalization was at his beck and call, like an unknown force only he could control. He could build anything he wanted.

She narrowed her eyes as she approached the curtained door ahead of her.

It had to be the Seed's power.

She didn't bother knocking as she pushed the red drapes aside. She knew full well that no one would hear her over the chattering of the women inside.

That was one thing Asch had obtained many of for some reason. Women.

The room was as she recalled many times before when she was previously and often summoned. Many luxuriously stiched pillows and blankets of satin, and walls of amythest and saphire.

And of course, many women.

She didnt dislike the harem, in fact some of the girls sometimes showed traces of people she could have possibly have gotten along with in another life. She could not however, seem to resist the contempt she had for the select few women who seemed exceedingly happy to fawn over Asch and brag about their life in high society.

In Scion's opinion, there was certainly nothing to brag about unless they were clueless enough to not realize that this was simply a well-designed _prison_.

After taking a few of them in, she allowed her green eyes to finally wander over to Asch.

He was sitting comfortably on a stack of large pillows, his arm draped loosly around a rather slender girl on his left. Scion took a moment to look her over, recognizing the girl to be one she quite liked secretly. Her hair was an astounding red, and long. Her eyes were also a shocking blood-red colour. Besides her wild appearance though, her face was sharp and insightful. She didnt seem to mind Asch near her, but no part of her body was willingly touching his.

On his other side was a new girl whom she had never seen before. Her hair was long and midnight black and her bangs were swept charmingly to the side. From her position, Scion could see her eyes were a piercing blue. She seemed to be sitting on the edge of her pillow, her eyes safely glaring dagger into the wall. Obviously an unwilling one.

The rest in the room were vaguely familiar or women she tended to ignore. Scion wasn't sure by which standards Asch 'recruited' women.

Then his eyes met hers and she did her very best to hold her gaze steady. He seemed to get all the answers he needed from her silence.

"So..." he began smoothly, darkly. "The mission was a fail."

"The barrier was too strong," Scion replied shortly. "I used all my energy and barely made it back."

He nodded a small, knowing nod before turning to the red head on his left and leaning in close to her ear and whispering. She stood up swiftly after he pulled away and approached Scion.

The silver haired girl knew what was coming before the other girl even reached her.

"Your sword..." the red-eyed girl asked determinedly, her gaze straight and unafraid. Scion pulled the sword from her back and handed the large blue blade to the girl. In response, the girl knelt to the ground - blade in hand - and Scion watched helplessly as it was swallowed up by suddenly liquid-like floor. Then it solidified, and just like that her sword was gone.

"So..." Asch continued once more as the harem girl made her way back to him. "My little Sin managed to hold her barrier against indignation..."

Scion gritted her teeth and nodded carefully.

"And her condition?" he asked.

For a moment Scion paused, fearful for them. "Fine," she lied.

He leaned back and narrowed his eyes at her. "Unfortunate."

Then he stood up and moved around the table in front of him. The black haired girl seemed to let a breath out as he passed, relieved. Asch didn't seem to notice though as he furrowed his eyebrows and approached Scion.

"She's so unwilling to join us isnt she...?"

Scion remained silent, until she realized that he was speaking particularly to the harem.

To her disgust, many of them scoffed or gave annoyed grunts at the mention of the tiny replica's capture. Scion could only assume this was from jealousy.

"Come..." he ordered her as he passed, and for the first time since being forced to do his bidding, she followed him willingly out of the chamber. He sealed the door behind him without so much as a glance backward.

"I'm not surprised to hear all this," he stated seriously. "I already know the nature of your failure."

Scion's eyebrows furrowed in was she hoped seemed to him like confusion, but in truth she already knew exactly what he was talking about. "Nature...?"

He turned on her quickly; a small, dark smirk present on his face. She supressed a gasp and pressed her back to the stone wall as his hands fell on either side of her. Then he leaned in so close that his deep red hair brushed against her arm.

"You're not loyal," he whispered. "Nor will you ever be. I know you Scion...and you know well the reason you failed!"

She stared back defiantly, sending him the most hatred-filled glare she could muster. But in truth, looking into his eyes was unnerving.

"Let me remind you...why you don't fail me," he murmured softly as he leaned in even more, his hand coming up to run along her jaw warningly. She slammed her green eyes shut in refusal, daring to hope that he would not treat her like one of his willing harem girls.

But that notion was swept away a moment later as the hard wall that she was pressing her back to liquified and fell away. She fell with it, landing somewhat heavily on the deep blue stone floor that was the next room.

He stepped in behind her fallen form, but in truth she could not be bothered with his closeness at this time. She was too scared to move as she gazed into the new room.

_'Please not this...!'_

"You know where we are..." he stated quietly, but Scion didn't miss the underlying warning tone. "Come."

The silver haired girl swallowed hard and shakily pushed herself to her feet. Suddenly it was all too real why she could never fail him again. Was the thought of freedom making her careless? Was she forgetting whose side she had to be on?

She didn't have the option of failure, as much before she tried to believe it would always be an option if the first didn't work out. This reminded her that it would never again be an option.

Asch's cold voice rang out across the dark room. Scion made sure her steps were slow and controlled.

This room did strange things to her. She wanted to run from it and yet, be close to it.

Or rather, the person within it.

The next time her gaze fell onto the corrupted king, he was standing with his back to her, partially blocking the very thing that got her heart racing from view.

"Look Scion..." Asch murmured. He sounded alarmingly like his old self. The silver haired girl ignored this as best she could - she knew he simply did it to shake her inside.

With her breathing fast, she closed the final few strides to his side and allowed herself to look down, realizing this was exactly what Asch wanted.

Her lime green eyes fell onto another man lying on an ornate crystal table, and for the first time in a very long time since Asch had first taken her into this room she felt as if she wanted to let her tears fall. She wished she didn't have to look at his peacefully sleeping face, because once she did, she was reminded forcibly of where her alligence lied.

With the sleeping man who resembled Asch.

Razal.

Scion could only stare in the silence.

"You love him...don't you?" Asch whispered darkly to her. She ripped her eyes away from the sleeping man and onto the former God-General.

It was when she locked her eyes upon his that she realized just how cruel this corrupted new being could be. For a moment, whether he allowed it or not, another set of green eyes were staring back at her.

She gasped and stepped back - wide eyed. _'Razal...!'_

"And if you love him, you'll do as I say from now on won't you?" Asch warned while coming closer, still allowing the deeper green eyes of her lover to sneak through his.

She was helplessly speechless.

"Won't you?" he asked again, harsher, daring her to consider a different path.

Then suddenly out of the corner of her locked gaze, she saw something blue and shining appear. She managed to tear her eyes away and realized in that horrifying moment that Asch had summoned her sword and was pressing the razored blade to the sleeping man's exposed neck.

"Yes! I will!" she she had no choice but to shout almost frantically then, her own cold voice cracking. "I will obey!"

She fell to her knees, realizing that she was totally defeated. "Please...just please don't kill him..." she begged desperately to the floor.

Asch's cold hand reached under her chin then, and forced her to raise her now glassy green eyes to him. She didnt even have the courage to reject the touch anymore. How could she, if it meant her lover's death?

His eyes were his own again. Behind their storming green depths, evil churned.

"I forgive you," he said softly before placing what she could only assume was the kiss of death gently upon her foreheard. Sealing her fate.

She knew there was no turning back now.

_'I'm so sorry Sin...'_

He pulled away then. "Now...it occurred to me that perhaps Sin could unknowingly hold that barrier forever. She's stubborn and strong."

Scion slowly raised herself to her feet, feeling numb but grudgingly obedient. "Perhaps..."

Asch nodded and strode away. Scion followed mechanically, knowing exactly where he was going and that she was meant to follow.

She reluctantly caught up to him, not daring to cast another glance back at her sleeping mate's body out of fear.

"Her rebellion stings me..." The red haired man seethed, his eyes narrowing menacingly. "She's forgotten who she is."

The silver haired girl clenched her teeth. _'That's not true...'_

"So we need someone else, a fresh start for her. Don't you agree?"

_'You're the one who has forgotten...'_

"Yes Asch, someone new to bring down the barrier from within."

He smirked. "Exactly."

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><p><strong>So the first chapter is done. A lot has happened since SwW lmao, so I have some explaining to do over the course of the story. I will get on it haha.<strong>

**Scion and Din do not exist together here. Scion is with Razal. I suggest you begin reading Halfdemon-kai's 'Without Reason' if you'd like to know more (but it's posted on my profile lol.) Oh wow. I'm just like 'Go here, go there.' We must have a series going here lmao.**

**I used two of my favorite OC's for the harem girls. I bet the owners will know who they are lol. Sorry I didn't ask for permission, I wanted it to be a surprize.**

**Kazink**


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